Rotoscoping with After Effects

Here is a little fun exercise utilizing the Rotoscoping (it really is just creating and modifying masks over time). Here is a screen shot of the video that I started with that has the background in it.
Here is the completed fictitious 15 second video where she is embedded without the background.

Kaliedoscope

A little Flash fun!
Click on the Image to Activate Kaleidoscope

Willy's Day

This is my first animation of any substance. Willy and Wynne are my original characters.

Enjoy!

Full Screen Version Click Here

Wacom Intuos 4 Tablet

I just got a new LARGE Intuos 4 tablet (18.7" x 12.6"). It is VERY nice! Even though I have a Cintiq21UX (I had a Intuos 3 6×8 before the Cintiq which I sold) it is a great compliment for everyday use when I am not drawing. I need the Cintiq for that purpose.

I really like the buttons function buttons along the left that light up and show you what you have programmed into them. The Zoom/Scroll wheel is also very nice.

Another nice feature is being able to move the mini-usb connection to the tablet to either the back or front depending on your computer setup.

The new pen holder is nice with a cradle across the top of it and additional “nibs” contained inside. The pen has been redesigned, but I didn’t notice much difference except that the “toggle” switch on the pen itself seems to be a bit more recessed than the old pen. Not sure after one night using it whether or not that is a good or bad thing.

Good job to Wacom!

E-Learning for Kids - States of Matter

States of Matter

E-Learning for Kids is a global organization that provides FREE e-learning courses to children around the globe.

I volunteered my time and energy as an Instructional Designer to write the storyboard for this course and to follow the development to completion.

Please share this site with your friends and colleagues and spread the word. All children deserve the chance to learn.

How to Cheat in Flash CS4

by Chris Georgenes

How to Cheat in Flash CS4, this is the book (revised for CS4) that really helped me get started in doing Flash animation. Chris's revised book is everything you would want to know about using Flash CS4 as an animator. Great new chapters covering the new features of CS4 along with some of the tried and true methods applicable to recent versions of Flash.

Chapters requiring CS4 are clearly marked with an icon, so even if you your still using CS3 you can still use this book with some of the new updated content.

Great section on basic interactivity using ActionScript with examples in AS2.0 and AS3.0 (Thanks David Stiller).

Dreamweaver the Missing Manual

By David Sawyer McFarland

About this Book
Dreamweaver CS4 The Missing Manual is a 1,064 page book. This is not a book you will want to put under your pillow at night, however you may want to use it as an exercise weight (it’s a BIG heavy book).

Seriously, this is a very good book for the beginner, intermediate or advanced Dreamweaver user. The book contains a comprehensive table of contents where materials can be easily found and accessed quickly without having to dig through the index at the back of the book (although the index is also thorough). The book is more of a “how to” book with step-by-step instructions than simply a reference manual.


The book is well organized into six basic parts of:
1. Building a Web Page
2. Building a Better Web Page
3. Bringing your Pages to Life
4. Building a Web Site
5. Dreamweaver Power
6. Dynamic Dreamweaver

For the beginner, section one is comprehensive enough that you can adequately build a small static website. Part two gets into more in-depth use of Cascading Style Sheets (liquid layouts, fixed layouts, elastic layouts, positioning of elements, navigation, etc.). In part three, Forms, inserting Flash movies, and Spry menus (drop down and fly out menus) are covered. Part four covers the intricate details of publishing your site to an Internet server and testing your site. Part five describes the use of templates and snippets (reusable HTML code) to standardize web pages layouts for large sites. In part six, dynamic website development (accessing a database) is covered. With Dreamweaver you can link to a database (MySQL, MS Access, Cold Fusion --- not SQL Server) and use Dreamweaver's wizards to help you create dynamic web sites.

Exercises are embedded into the chapters so that you can work through examples and see what the real pages look like “on the web”. The exercise files are on the web at www.missingmanuals.com (click on the CD icon) along with links to working pages on the web of the solutions.

About the Author
The author David Sawyer McFarland has been a web developer since 1995 and has been using and teaching Dreamweaver since version 2. He currently teaches at Portland State University in Oregon.